┏━━━━⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆━━━━┓

THE LOSER HAS TO FALL

AN UNLIKELY SIGHT GREETED THEM AT THE DOOR TO THE LOFT.

"It's just like old times," Emerson laughed, masking the painful sensation that the motion brought with a large smile.

Peter matched the smile, though his brow was raised. "What, are we expecting another alpha pack already?"

She smacked his arm. "Don't jinx it."

Derek rolled his eyes, but nonetheless peeled back the door that revealed the state of the loft. Isaac grimaced, surveying the grim scene. "This places looks gross," after a narrowed look from Derek, the boy back-tracked, "no offence. It looks lovely the other, uh, eighty nine percent of the time."

Emerson hummed, her hand mindlessly resting on the side of her stomach. "That's... oddly specific."

"But am I wrong?" he asked her, and her silence gave him the answer he was looking for. "Exactly."

Peter let himself in, sauntering over to the desk in the corner that looked worse for wear. Papers were scattered beneath it, and he happily went over to investigate. Isaac, when left to his own devices, simply went toward the couch where the cushions were left in complete disarray.

Hell, it looked like someone tried to flip the damn thing over, but failed and settled on ruining the cushions instead. The whole place had looked better, and she could only wonder what transpired while they'd been at the cabin and while she had been taken hostage.

Derek was still beside her, his body facing hers. "You owe me a conversation," he said with a small grin, his arms crossed over his chest.

She leaned against one of the beams that supported the loft, shaking her head. "We can have all the conversations you want," she started, just before she gestured around the space, "after we clean this shit up."

Derek gave her a huff, but sauntered off in the direction of the massive hole in the wall. Emerson took that as a yes, pushing off the beam herself before she walked over to Issac. The boy obviously struggling to figure out which cushions went where.

"A conversation?" he inquired with a wiggle of his eyebrows, voice kept in a hush despite the loft's occupants being more than able to hear him.

Emerson shoved at his side. "A conversation between two adults," she replied, "meaning: no Isaac."

His face twisted up. "Oh, so Peter can hear it but I can't?" he scoffed. "That's pretty rude, Em."

"No Peter, either," she chuckled, turning her head slightly as to block the boy from seeing her wince. "It's between Derek and I, that's all. Don't be all nosey about it."

"Oh, so you're finally revealing your undying love for each other? Is it that?"

Emerson sputtered, a sudden cough wracking her body as she tried to dismiss Isaac's words with a wave. "You're full of shit, Lahey."

"Deflecting... how interesting," he goaded on, a smirk on his face from how her cheeks turned a light red.

"I—" the defensive look on her face dropped as her stomach gave a vicious churn. "I–I need to—"

Emerson shot off in the direction of the bathroom, shaky legs wobbling with each step she made before she reached her destination. She might as well have ripped the hinges off, all but slamming the door behind her before toppling to the ground.

There was so much blood.

Blood with the darkest tinge, starkly contrasting the colour of the porcelain toilet bowl. It was similar to the puddle of it she'd expelled in the basement, but she was feeling better.

Granted, her stomach had been aching ever since they got rescued by Scott and his almighty ladder, and Isaac had been taking her pain before, but had she ignored more violent signs of what was happening? She knew the wolfsbane poisoning to her hands could've attributed to her weakness— but her stomach?

Lifting up her shirt, her eyes widened at the sight she was greeted with. Not only was her skin a sickly pale, but dark veins were protruding from what appeared to be an injection site. A small, pinprick-sized hole was at the epicentre, and she shuddered.

Emerson foolishly assumed that with the Darach dead, things would go back to normal. The weather cleared up nicely, so really, she half expected for her apparent sickness to go away just as nicely. She'd never seen anything like this,

What had Jennifer Blake done to her?

"Emerson? Emerson, you okay?" Isaac's voice called out from the other side of the door.

She couldn't answer, not when another wave of nausea bubbled within her. The blonde was doubled over the toilet, though it was getting harder to keep her head upright. It thunked against the floor along with the rest of her body, and she was suddenly faced with the desire to fall asleep.

Tired. She was tired, but this was just her body fighting off the wolfsbane. Wasn't it?

The door burst open, citrus filtering into the small room. The man sunk to the ground, her head finding purchase in their lap, as the others loomed from above. "Emerson— you gotta tell me what's wrong," Derek demanded, his eyes raking over her shuddering form. It was precisely how Cora had looked before he coughed up his power to save her, and it made his shake at her shoulders. "C'mon Em. What hurts?"

Another hand touched her forehead, and the blurry face of Peter Hale entered her direct line of sight. "She's pale, burning up," he stated, looking down at her, "Emerson, can you hear me?"

Emerson could only whine, sluggishly pushing the prodding hands away. It was all too much, the sounds and smells, the franticness of the werewolves that surrounded her.

"What's wrong with her?" Isaac asked, voice getting loud amidst the sounds that were coming from the girl on the ground.

Maybe the panic was showing in her eyes, maybe it wasn't, or maybe Derek could always get a good read on her. "Mistletoe," Derek grit out, his hands coming to Emerson's shoulders in an attempt to stop her from shaking too violently. He looked up at the two, "and we just killed the one person who could've helped us."

"Jennifer would've never helped us, you know that," Peter snapped in reply, though it was partly because he, too, was on edge. "That's why you did what you did to save Cora."

Derek looked down at the girl writhing around in his arms, at the sweat beading by her hairline at an accelerated rate, at the smell in the room radiating off of her.

She smelt like death... certainly looked like it too.

Panic curdled in his chest, trying to search his brain for a solution. He couldn't lose Emerson, his Emerson. They had too much to talk about, they had too much to say. Fuck, he had so much to say.

"Okay, so what do we do?" Isaac stressed, looking between the two Hale men. Their silence set his nerves alight. "Seriously guys, what the hell do we do?! We can't just—"

"Get him out of here," Emerson interjected with a heave, trying her best to focus her gaze on Derek. "Isaac c–can't be— he can't be h–here."

A unanimous look of confusion spread across the three of them. "What?" Isaac asked, looking down at her in confusion. "I'm not leaving, no way. Not until—"

"He can't be here," she repeated, her head whipping to the side to cough up even more blood. A hand wiped the corner of her mouth, but she relented on. "He can't, he can't— get him out of here, please—"

"Call Deaton!" Derek barked out. "Do whatever you can to get his ass here, now!"

Peter's hand shot out toward Isaac when the boy tried to move into the space, and they were gone before she could even blink. She heard the boy's shouts of protest, followed by the silence that the older Hale man could only offer up.

"Tell me what to do," Derek pleaded, his hand coming to her forehead. His uncle was right; her body temperate had skyrocketed, and now he was aware of her eyelids only being half open. How had he missed the signs? "Tell me what to do and I'll do it."

Emerson felt like her body was being burned alive, but she was too weak to thrash and throw a fit about it. No, she lay there groggily, trying to focus on the curve of his nose and the way his eyes were a little red.

"I o–owe you a conversation," she tried, her smile caked with the darkness that was splattered on the floor just to their right.

Derek swallowed, his head shaking. "No," he denied, his lips pursing for a beat, "no, because we're gonna have it later. Later, when you're better."

There was something morbid that slithered its way into Emerson's mind, through the pain and despair that was filling her senses already.

Some people knew when their time was up, lying on their deathbeds and waiting for the storm to settle. Waiting to transcend into wherever they wished to go. It was like a feeling, a looking one that came in the form of a ticking clock.

Emerson could almost envision the clock in her mind if she tried hard enough.

"I don't think there's g–gonna be a later, Dere."

"Don't say that," he snapped. "You don't know that. Peter's gonna get Deaton, okay? You'll be fine."

Denial. In his mind, denial was the best thing he could do, because what else was there? Really, what else was he supposed to do? He hadn't felt this useless since high school, when one love got ripped away from him. Deja vu filled his chest, sorrowful and agonizing.

"Okay," she agreed, but only for his sake. In truth, the truth she knew so well, Emerson had been dodging death for many years. She was already on her ninth life, because nothing was ever easy nor did anything ever work out in her favour. Due to that, due to the obvious, she knew that this was it.

Emerson Avery was dying, and the last thing she wanted— no, the last thing she needed to see, was Derek Hale.

Minutes, she doesn't know how many, of silence passed between them. All that could be heard was a soft series of hums coming from the man and pained wheezing coming from the blonde. They were bidding time, but there was something on the tip of her tongue.

If her gut was right, if this was it, she couldn't have any regrets. She couldn't leave anything unsaid, no matter how assured Derek was.

"I like you a whole lot," she whispered out, just seconds before another horrible cough wracked her body. "I'm sorry I— that it took m–me so long to tell you."

The man laughed wetly. "If it makes you feel any better, I like you a whole lot, too," he confessed, and the very words of confirmation he said aloud made Emerson exhale a deep breath. "Just needed to get my head out of my ass, huh?"

"N–not your fault it was way up there," she joked, squeezing at his wrist lightly. Derek huffed out another chuckle, the corners of his mouth upturned for just a moment. "Let me s–see you."

Derek's eyebrows furrowed. "What do you mean?"

"Just wanna see you," she said, craning her head as a way to try and see him more clearly. He gave her a smile, adjusting her so she was full in his lap, his grip unrelenting. She sighed, head sagging against his shoulder. "J–just wanna see you."

Blood seeped out of the corner of her mouth at the exact moment her eyes drooped, her hand dropping from his wrist. "Hey, hey, hey," he tried, shaking her a little. Her eyes stuttered, unfocused for a beat. "Keep those eyes open for me, yeah? Don't do this to me, Emerson."

The blonde sucked in a breath, each blink feeling like a battle of its own. "Can I—" she coughed, this one feeling different from the rest. "C–can I tell you somethin'?"

"Anything," was his immediate response. "Anything, just— keep your eyes open, alright? I can hear them coming, Em. You're gonna be fine."

Emerson tried to nod, but she wasn't sure if she did. Everything felt stranger now, like her head was wrapped in a dense film that seperated her sense from the outside word. Regardless, she had one thing to do.

One thing to do, just in case she was right.

"I–I really wanted it to be me and you," she whispered out, voice light despite her chemosignals emitting a copious amount of fear.

"In the end, just— just me and y–you. S'what I wanted."

And suddenly, it wouldn't matter if Deaton and Peter were actively running up the stairs that led to the loft as she said so. It wouldn't matter if they had their feet through the threshold, supplies in hand.

There was only one heartbeat in the loft.

⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆

[ wyn's note ]

forty four chapters later, and COME DOWN SOON had come to an end.

as emotionally damaging as this has been, cause lord even I teared up doing this one, don't worry because there's an epilogue coming! aka you should see it up already if you've finished this chap :)

all my love!

ps. im aware you're all hiding under my bed waiting to strike... nothing that I, bronwyn the angst lover, am not used to LOLOL